If you are a fan of Aaron B. Koontz and Cameron Burns’ film Scare Package, you came to the right place with their latest western-horror cocktail, The Pale Door. Again, the team executes an innovative and propulsive approach that comes from their reverence and passion for genre.

This time around, we are dealing with a brothel of witches and some bank-robbing cowboys instead of Rad Chad and his emporium of horror anthology.

The Pale Door focuses on The Dalton Gang and a particular train robbery in which they steal more than they can deal with in the form of a young girl locked in a steamer trunk. When the gang heads out to lay low at a brothel, all hell breaks loose over a night of cowboys vs witches in a battle for survival.

I’d be remiss to tell you that the film is just that. There are plenty of emotional punch points laying in its undercurrent. Gripping and emotional bits of what it is to be family – particularly what it is to be brothers. But, its more fun to discover those organically while watching because they are the real currency of the entire picture.

“The make-up effects are really cool

and best of all they are practical.”

Fans of westerns are in a for a huge treat with The Pale Door. In fact, a large portion of the film is a straight-up, full-fledged western picture. Even in that, the film makes nice choices between committing to emotional weight and the ability to switch to pulpy, dime-store western magazine fun. The film also is a who’s-who of easter egg shots. Several scenes are framed beautifully and pay homage to greats like, The Long Riders, Pale Rider and others. The ability to make those bits of homage feel entirely organic assists in creating a larger and classic approach to the experience.

Much like From Dusk Till Dawn, The Pale Door waits to spring the supernatural fun on the audience. This time instead of vampires, we are attacked by a special brand of witches. It’s a really fun approach to the classic witch too. These particular witches are vicious and share a lot more physical traits as demons and werewolves do. They are the running on the ceiling, jump across rooms and tear your eyeballs out kind of witches, as opposed to the classic toil and trouble version of cinema’s crones.

The make-up effects are really cool and best of all they are practical. The attacking witches are entirely made up of burnt flesh. The make-up created for them along with the addition of perfectly lit encounters are a nice melding of two departments working entirely in sync. The make-up team does a really nice job with its shoot ‘em up portions of the film too. Creating great moments like one where a cowboy is stapled to a wall by his neck, using a gigantic hunting knife. More of that kind of thing, please!

The score for The Pale Door absolutely rules. It takes classic western score fragments and subverts them entirely, creating something that works well with the film’s jukes and turns from horror to western. I’ll definitely be looking to add it to the collection.

“The Pale Door is a

fantastically fun and innovative

weaving of western and horror fare”

Everyone in this cast is phenomenal. From Pat Healy’s austere and calculated approach to his character Wylie, to the larger than life and amiable role that Stan Shaw fills – The Pale Door is a film that would work even if it was just this cast sitting around a table playing cards. So, when you take that and add in witches, wolves and shoot ‘em up scenes it immediately just works. Ultimately, the amazing cast grounds the entire thing and does a really nice job of keeping the film on a carefully walked line of the fanciful horror and well-executed emotional punches.

Melora Walters is absolutely incredible as the leader of this particular brothel of witches. Walters has this magical ability of creating a character with just as much quiet menace as she evokes sympathy. She executes everyone of her choices with elegance even when they are at their most terror driven. It’s great to see Walters show up in a horror film. She is an actress who has had me devoted to anything she does ever since starring in Paul Thomas Anderson’s Magnolia. She has a weightless, intensity that is singular and she definitely brings it in droves to The Pale Door.

The Pale Door is a fantastically fun and innovative weaving of western and horror fare. It’s ability to balance the effective emotional drama with its exciting horror and faithful western elements is an accomplishment. An accomplishment that is a blast to watch. It’s simultaneously an extreme bit of witchy terror, cowboy shoot ‘em up pulp and truly fun cinema.

The Pale Door is now available in theaters, on Demand and Digital. Check local showtimes.